Hurray for the Education Select Committee - they speak sense

[BizzyLizzy70]

As a parent of a Year 7 child, I was delighted and relieved that the Education Select Committee's report was so clear in their conclusion that the timescales for introducing all these changes is too tight. I am now a secondary school science teacher and was 16 in 1988, the first year to do GCSE. I remember clearly how nervous the teachers were at delivering the syllabus and the few precious 'past' papers. I have been told GCSEs were trialled in some form for 10 years. Having studied statistics, I am incensed at the flimsy evidence Gove uses to back up his beliefs. It is right and proper that the Committee found no evidence of this merits of this qualification over the GCSE. There can only be no evidence as the new papers do not even exist yet, let alone trialled. Presumably there will be a trial? Gove has been quoted as stating that if it all goes wrong, '..on my head be it'. Well no, it will be on my daughter's and her friend's heads. Thanks.

I agree totally. Gove ricochets from one reform to another, leaving chaos in his wake! Saw a comment on twitter from a school governor today noting that there simply isn't enough trained language teachers to deliver the EBAC nationally, and where exactly is the research that effectively devalues music, or RE, or art, or drama....?

The school where my DCs attend scored 43% A* - C in EBAC subjects in this year's league tables. The English GCSE cock up (papers in June with tighter grade boundaries than the Jan exam) meant that the school would have achieved 60% if the Jan grade boundaries had applied. The whole thing is an unholy mess, and it's our childrens' futures that he's playing fast and loose with!

I too hope Gove will listen. I was disappointed when languages were dropped from the national curriculum several years ago but I still don't see the value in forcing children to learn something they don't enjoy when their talents lie elsewhere. Why should Geography be considered a priority over Music, or over three sciences/two languages/art/music/DT/PE for a pupil with a skill in that area? We will lose specialist teachers and schools will be filled with bored kids who know they are going to fail before they've even learned anything.